Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Yep! You drive me crazy!

So this last week I have really seen part of Sydnee's personality come out. Or maybe I just notice when some things she does are just absolutely so funny that I can't help but wonder, whose child is that? I love how she says "love" or any word with an L in it. Her love kind of sounds like "lub" but with more of a long "u" sound and she somehow rolls her L's. So we really like it when she says "I'm going to see Uncle Alan in a little bit." It sounds like "I'm seeing luncle lalan in a lolttle bit." It can be fun having a kid! Sometimes.

Sydnee likes to say, "Yep"

Me: Do you want some orange juice?
Syd: Yep. Blue cup
Me: You want it in a blue cup?
Syd: Yep.

Me: Did you go teetee in the potty?
Syd: Yep. Now I get chocwate (chocolate)

And the conversations never end.

She hasn't figured out the thought process of "why" yet. So we aren't at the stage where I know I will end up saying: BECAUSE I SAID SO! but we are at the discovery stage.

In the garage with her daddy:

S: What's that?
M: A lawn mower
S: What's that?
M: A weed-eater
S: What's that?
M: A lawn mower
S: What's that?
M: A weed-eater

It's a good thing he is patient because they did that for about 5 minutes. She knows what they are now. And she asks what everything is called! At least she is learning and remembers!

Other Sydnee-isms that make us laugh:

Going to the potty.

Syd: Can lion come?
Me: Sure, lion can come
(in the bathroom)
Syd: Ok lion, you watch shower curtain
(lion faces shower curtain while Sydnee goes potty)

At dinner waiting for everyone to finish.

Syd: All done!
Michael: Aunt Susie's not done
(15 second pause)
Syd: All done now?
Me: No, she's not all done
(15 second pause)
Syd: All done now?
Susie: I'm almost done
Syd: All done!
Me: No, she has a few more bites
(Syd peers around the tea and looks at her plate, it's empty.)
Syd: All done
Me: We need to ask Aunt Susie if she is all done
Syd: Please Susie all done? (emphatic use of hand signs as well)

Moral of the story? Sydnee does not like to wait to be done.

But the real kicker is when I realized how much she listens and repeats what is said. It is  very humbling.

Getting in her booster seat. Her brother is crying in his bassinet. I haven't had any coffee yet and she needs to show her independent streak.

Syd: I do it myself
Me: Please Syd, let me help.
Syd: No, I do it!
Me: Oh Syd!
Syd: You drivin me crazy

Obviously I say that last part too much. I keep thinking it's better than telling her how frustrated she is making me, but I guess anything comes across as frustration. So "Yep", my kid know that she "drives me crazy!"

Thursday, August 8, 2013

All before Noon

We have had an exciting day to say the least. I am hoping this afternoon isn't so crazy. To start off, we were up by 7 am. This means my children had 5 hours to make my life crazy. But it wasn't my children who started the crazy off. No, it wasn't even my husband. It was the ANTS! I am really starting to dislike this insect. They are everywhere! We clean, we spray, we clean, we spray and they still show up! Last night Michael sprayed the whole living and kitchen area to kill the ants and I cleaned the floor with enough bleach to make you feel woozy. And then we found them in our bathroom this morning. Right on the other side of the kitchen wall is our bathroom. They were everywhere. Mostly in my wet bathing suit which was on the bathroom counter. I mean, I know Michael said he wanted the bathroom organized so we could use the whole counter, but I mean it didn't have to get to this extreme! He didn't really plant the ants there, but the bathroom is clean. Maybe it was just bad karma because I didn't respect the double sinks. I mean, we have never had two sinks before and I used mine to store all my stuff until I could organize as I see fit. So maybe it's my fault? Well I left the ants until the kids would take a nap. No use poisoning my children.

So back to when they get up. I have to BRIBE my daughter with food and movies just to use the potty. So I said no orange juice until you try to potty. And boy did she potty! She had so much pee because she woke with a dry diaper! I was so proud of that and I feel like we have been pretty successful in the potty training area. Then we had breakfast and she wanted to go outside. So we played outside. Then we came in and she played inside and finally go bored and I turned on her favorite...the lion movie AKA The Lion King. So we watched the movie. RJ was playing and sleeping and just being great. In fact, he is a great baby. He has really taken to sleeping in his bassinet. Another small victory! But Sydnee finished her movie and wanted to have a snack so I let her snack and then I needed at least an hour of activity to keep her focused before lunch and nap time. Swimming wouldn't cut it because my suit had ants all over it and hers was still dirty from yesterday. So I said let's paint! She helped me get out all the paint and the table cover and her cardboard to paint on and I gave her the palette of paints and started to make dinner. We are having twice baked potatoes by the way. Well after I put the potatoes in the oven and got RJ up to feed him, I thought, she can do this by herself. She is doing great. Her hands are covered in paint but that's not a big deal. And then she said, "All done!" I asked her to wait until RJ finished eating (at least finish nursing one side) and then I got up to clean off her "hands"


She got to take a bath in the sink and in the tub. There is still paint in her hair and in her eye lashes. I think she had fun. That's the important part right?

So then she had her lunch and I finished nursing RJ and she went down for her nap. I ate my lunch and put RJ down so I could clean the bathroom. Well I remembered the potatoes in the oven. There is a reason you poke holes in the potatoes. I just didn't realize how important that was until now.


They explode...in case you didn't know. But I had cleaning to do so I will deal with those later. I went into our bathroom and I cleaned and organized and washed all the towels and floor mats. And then I sprayed. I am sure I sprayed too much for such a small space because it smells in there now, but I wanted to kill any and all ants. I have started to feel like a story I read in high school. Leiningen vs. the Ants. Now granted, these ants are not flesh eating, but I feel like they have taken over the whole house. Hopefully we will have killed a lot and my plan is to spray once a week for several weeks to make sure we keep them away.

Well now I'm off to fix my potato mess! Wish me luck!

Friday, August 2, 2013

It's Potty Time with Sydnee!

Well let me start off by saying that I have given potty training a half-hearted effort since she discovered the potty and wanted to try to go on it. I started putting her in pull-ups in November of last year and thought we would eventually work our way to the potty and it would be super easy. Then I started working and it just never came around and I let it get away from us. We did try one weekend and she held her pee in for so long that when she went to bed that night she peed through a diaper, her clothes and had a large puddle on her bed. I didn't even try the next day. Then we had RJ. Well I had to buy diapers for him and her at the same time. I looked at the total and I thought, I have to do something about this! This is so expensive and crazy. And then two weeks ago, I found a blog on Pinterest about potty training and how to go about it. I had heard other ideas and I thought, "I can do this!" And yes, we are potty training with a 5 week old in the house but I was determined to go back to work next week with a fully potty trained kiddo. So here is how our week has progressed in potty training.

At the bottom I will post the site I took my potty training ideas from but here is what we started with on Monday. I had 5 pairs of little girl panties, 1 bag of Pretzel M&M's ( why pretzel? they were on sale), 3 "poop" prizes", 1 package of stickers, 1 kid potty and a lot of prayer. The weekend before, we talked to Sydnee about being potty trained. She has the Elmo Potty Train book and we read that a few times and she told people she was going to be potty trained next week like Elmo. She was very excited. This is an idea I took from the blog I read. So when Monday rolled around I got up and had everything ready. I showed her the prizes and told her when she had to go potty to tell me or just go use her potty.

Monday:
Sydnee wasn't too thrilled about having to go without a diaper. She kept asking to have it put on so she could run around. I told her big kids don't wear diapers and she was going to be potty trained. No more diapers. I tried to keep her in the kitchen because I didn't really want to chase her around the house and worry about pee in a corner or anything like that. And it worked for the most part. Then she had her first accident. She didn't even try to go potty in the potty all morning. Around 9 she peed all over the laundry room floor and cried. She did not like the feeling of pee running down her leg. I mean, who could blame her! I cleaned it up and told her that feeling is when she needs to use the potty. And then we went on with our morning. By now she was tired of all the stuff in the kitchen and wanted to watch a movie in the living room. It is right off the kitchen and I told her, if she goes in there, she has to sit on her potty. So for the next hour or so, she sat on her potty and watched a movie. Then she "accidentally" went potty in the potty. She was so excited! She ran up to me and said "I went potty! I get chocolate!" So I praised her and gave her chocolate and we cleaned her potty out. And that was pretty much all the I had to do for her. She knew the feeling and the whole rest of the day she used the potty when she felt the urge. We had a few problems when Daddy came home because he was distracting, but she would start to go, stop herself, run to the potty and then finish. We were very proud of her. So if she went the whole time without accident she got 2 M&M's and if she started somewhere else and finished in the potty she got 1. She gets 4 if she poops but she didn't want to even try that. So she only wore a diaper for nap and bedtime. She wet a little during both so I am glad we kept those on her.

Tuesday:
We got up and I tried to get her to potty. She didn't want to but I told her she needed to try. So she sat for all of 2 seconds and was done. OH well. I let her put panties on around 10 because I wanted her to get used to taking them off when she went potty. The blog I read said to do naked baby for 3 days because they still have lots of accidents. Well we only had 1 real accident on the first day and I thought, ehh...what's the big deal. I will get back with why I should have followed that plan. But she had a minor accident in her panties the first time she went potty. She started to go and stopped leaving a few little drops in her 'drawers' as her daddy likes to call them. So she went without for a little bit and then I put some new ones on her. I followed the advice on that one. She went all day without any more accidents until her daddy got home. She just didn't get her panties all the way down before she started to go and we were quickly running out of panties! The only downside was that she hadn't pooped in the potty yet. She hadn't gone in 2 days because she didn't want to! I was hoping for a successful poop on Wednesday so I could run some errands and try out our new potty training! I really needed to go to Target!

Wednesday:
With the last of our panties, these are the Gerber training kind, we set out for another successful day. She goes on her own. She doesn't need reminding. She actually says "Uh Oh I need to go potty!" and goes by herself. Then announces she 'needs chocolate', like the she "needs" another whole in her head. But she played and didn't have any issues that I could tell. And then IT happened. Right in her Gerber panties. She had been running around like some Risky Business character (t-shirt, white undies and sunglasses - Thanks Uncle Alan!) and I smelled it. We cleaned her up and I made her go without for a half hour. This is where the naked baby would have played out well if I would have followed that advice but that is in the past now. Oh well.  She still wanted to sit on the furniture. No panties=no furniture for her so she waited it out and then we put some back on. Needless to say, my Target trip was postponed until the evening. She had another poop accident that night and I thought, well she might have to do naked baby all over again. I feel kind of like I messed that whole process up. However, I have talked to several people and read that sometimes that is the hardest part because they are scared to do their business and it will eventually come. I guess I am taking that approach because a crying and kicking and screaming two year old is just not that fun to be around, especially when all you ask them to do is sit on a potty. She just didn't want to be forced. It will be a battle for another day. So 2 accidents today.

Thursday:
Today I had to go to the doctor. I put Sydnee at the YMCA for off-site so I could go with only 1 child. I told them she was going potty. In fact, when we got there, she wanted to go right away and I took her and she went and then I dropped her off. I told them she does really well but will need to be asked to go about every half hour or so. She had 1 accident. She started to go, stopped and finished in the potty. I thought that was pretty good considering it was her first outing away from her little potty. Then she slept all through her nap in just her panties without an accident. I think we are about done with diapers during that time. I will do a few more nap diapers just in case but she hasn't wet at all since Monday. Her bedtime diapers are less and less too. That makes for a happy mommy! We went out last night to the AT&T store, Rosas, and HEB. At the AT&T store she asked to go potty and they let us use the employee potty. She made it the whole time there without messing up even though we had to go a ways to get to the back of the store to use the potty. Then she didn't want to try at the restaurant or at HEB. I think the restrooms that have auto flushes or auto dryers scare her and she doesn't want to stay in there. But she came home and went on her own. The downside was that she held it for so long she didn't quite make it all the way with her shorts coming down. Better luck next time.

Friday:
She woke up with a dry diaper! She went potty on her own and is now playing. I am so  thrilled. I can do this. She can do this! Now just to get the full potty train effect. I know we can get it all squared away and NO MORE DIAPERS!! We also have very little chocolate left. I did go buy her more panties so that when we have accidents we have another pair to put on. By the way, children will go through underwear quickly. I thought have a small supply was ok. It's not. You need a large supply and then you cut back through the years. She hasn't received any of her poop prizes and our stickers are still on the counter. However, I feel confident in what we did to get her potty trained. I am hoping to get the last part down soon but I don't want to stress her in the process and make her regress. We are committed at this point!

And for those of you who want to know how RJ is doing, he is great. Sleeps about 5-6 hours at night. He eats well. He peed on me this morning (oh the irony). I think he has grown some more. He definitely weighs more. He has slept two nights in his bassinet and we are hoping this is going to be his new trend. He actually went to sleep in it last night so that is a plus. Now to get him to sleep longer and to possibly go to bed earlier. I am working on his morning wake time since he likes to sleep late but I have a feeling that will come next week as I start work!

Thanks for reading!
http://www.growingajeweledrose.com/2012/05/how-i-potty-trained-my-daughter-in-3.html